Sanju: What Rajkumar Hirani didn’t show in the Sanjay Dutt biopic

Seven days on, Rajkumar Hirani’s biopic on Bollywood’s original bad boy has crossed the ₹200 crore mark. In a parallel world, by now, reams have been written about how Sanju champions a soft-focus portrait of Sanjay Dutt, feverishly intent on absolving him of his many wrongs by omitting significant chapters of his life. “With biopics you have to be very selective,” Sanju director told GQ in this interview earlier. So what did Hirani not show in Sanju, the superhit biopic of Sanjay Dutt?

The women in Dutt’s life

The most important women in Sanjay Dutt’s life are conspicuously absent in Sanju. His sisters Namrata and Priya are relegated to obligatory showpieces, deserving not even as much as one proper scene to acknowledge the sibling bonding. This omission stands out all the more as Sanjay Dutt, both in the film and in reality, claims that one of the key reasons for his acquiring weapons in 1993 was to “protect” his sisters, following the rape threat the Dutts received. Dutt’s wives — Richa Sharma, his great love who succumbed tragically young to cancer, and Rhea Pillai, his pillar of strength during his dark days of incarceration — are not even blips on the One-Man-Many-Lives’ radar. Perhaps Dutt’s darling daughter Trishala, who lives in the US, could have been woven in as a cursory mention? Not for the heck of it, but maybe only to sweeten the drama?

As for mother Nargis, her unidimensional presence in the film exists merely to push her son into the throes of drug addiction — first upon learning of her illness, then upon her passing — or pull him out of it in the most Bollywood manner conceivable; insert high-pitched Sukhwinder Singh-powered clarion call and illusory sightings of Manisha Koirala on clifftops egging Ranbir Kapoor on to Fateh Har Maidan. It’s quite another matter that Sanjay Dutt’s foray into drugs began much before he began shooting for Rocky (as shown in the film); it was during his one year in Elphinstone College in 1978, in his attempt to pursue an arts degree.

Sanjay Dutt’s girlfriends

Of Dutt’s many girlfriends from his early years, personalities of a few are funneled into Sonam Kapoor’s Ruby, an endearing character whose exit, too, would send Dutt on the precipice of drug-induced self-destruction. However, none of Dutt’s affairs with Bollywood actresses spilled onto the script, and understandably so — his brag in the film of having slept with 308 girlfriends is only to fire up the imagination of the audience, not to complicate it.

Sanjay Dutt’s friendship with other Bollywood stars

There’s also a stony silence on Sanjay Dutt’s friendship and camaraderie with fellow Bollywood stars. Clearly, that’s a glitch in the script matrix? It’s a shame that a biopic on a Bollywood hero has nearly nothing to show of his immediate and intimate universe — no bromance with ‘bhai’ Salman Khan, no moment of clarity on a film set, no goofing around with David Dhawan or Govinda, and quite obviously no fleeting reference to Bollywood-underworld proximity of those days.

Sanjay Dutt’s iconic films

For an actor whose filmography counts more than 180 films in 37 years, all Sanju looks at are just two films — Rocky (1981) and Munna Bhai M.B.B.S. (2003). None of Dutt’s most iconic films — Naam (1986), Hathyar (1989), Saajan (1991), Sadak (1991), Khalnayak (1993), Vaastav (1999), Kaante (2002), Lage Raho Munna Bhai (2006), Shootout at Lokhandwala (2007), and Agneepath (2012) — are even referred to, save for a poster of Khalnayak being painted black in one token shot.

The significance of these films in Dutt’s film career and life can’t be overstated. Naam saw Dutt being his real, uninhibited self, coming on the back of quitting drugs and all pumped up to prove his critics wrong; Sadak unleashed a fierce, desi Robert De Niro-esque Taxi Driver in him; the menacing villainy in Khalnayak was his ticket to superstardom; Vaastav would become not just a cult movie but also deliver one of Bollywood’s most stellar grey characters; Agneepath recalibrated the ferocity of evil with his tonsured, creepy Kancha Cheena act; and enough’s been said about Lage Raho and Dutt’s Gandhigiri image makeover campaign, also presented by Hirani.

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Like most biographies and biopics, Sanju shows its protagonist in a favourable light but there are almost no references to Sanjay Dutt’s penchant for wild choices… choices that made him the man he is.